That Standing Gate
by reminiscent-afterthought
Summary: [AU] There was a gate defended by five mysterious people with equally mysterious dragons, and it was the goal of every game player - to defeat them and open the gate. But not one of those people knew what lay behind it.
1. Prologue

**A/N:** Written for the Ultimate Fanfic Challenge 200 prompts, prompt #202 – arrogance. Additional authors notes at the end for anyone interested. :D

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**That Standing Gate  
Prologue**

**.**

It was a gate that had been claimed and sealed by a team of five almost as soon as the game began, and since then no-one had managed to open it. What lay beyond remained a secret to everybody save those five, and whoever ventured too close to try and see, or to ask, were forced back by their overwhelming strength.

It became known in the years to come as The Standing Gate: the one gate in the history of the game that had been sealed and never reopened again. Some people thought the end of the game lay beyond that: something that could make them eternally powerful, unbeatable. Others, few and far between, thought it was the failsafe: the thing that would shut down that virtual world forever.

But no facts were ever released, no rumours confirmed. All the players knew was that the guardians were strong, too strong to beat. No-one even knew who they were in real life: just that they were five and there, a constant. Some wondered if they existed in real life at all, or were just NPCs, a permanent part of the game. They barely even knew about their decks, their strategies; no-one who lost to them could recall anything beyond the shadow of a magnificent dragon – and even the appearance of that dragon changed: anything from long and slender and transparent like the wind to sturdy and blowing red like molten lava from a volcano that framed the five indistinct human figures.

The Standing Gate became a legend in a corner of that virtual world few dared now to go. Away from it, the game went on. They duelled each other one on one like knights aiming for a higher rank. They waged battles on anywhere that could become a battlefield in magnificent battle royales that were restrained by few but absolute rules. They gained and lost power; they won, they lost, they grew. A few names went on to become famous, until others pushed them down into the rivers of the past. The thrones that belonged to the highest scoring team frequently changed hands. New people from the bottom surged up. The game world grew more entertaining, more ruthless. The buildings, the cities, all of them had been remade.

But the Standing Gate was something that hadn't changed, its peak barely visible in the black land in the west, untouchable and coveted. Because the unspoken agreement had spread: whoever could defeat those mysterious guardians and open the gate would be the ultimate victors in the game.

And while it was just a game, just a virtual world they enjoyed, there was many a child who wanted that…despite what they could potentially unleash from its confines. Because all of it: the battles in which they threw their cards – their monsters and spells and traps – to strike and defend, the wars in which all the conventional rules were tossed aside to go against positional power, the territories they gained and modified to turn into their own kingdoms and advantage and a maze of tricks and traps against invaders…all of it was a magnificent game in a virtual world. The fighters were people, mostly children, who left their ordinary lives outside and returned to them afterwards, wearing their avatars, their virtual personas, like anyone in a RPG would.

Not one of them thought that what lay beyond the gate they aspired towards could be something with enough power to destroy them all.

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**Post A/N:** The prologue sort of just introduces the main conflict and the role; the next chapter will introduce specific characters and action. Probably not a one-on-one duel right off the bat, but maybe a "war" battle royale. :D

The virtual world is a mix between the world of Digimon Frontier and the world of 5D's. Duel Runners are more means for transportation to remote areas, but battles with them can take place on highway areas (places with long stretch of road). If you're somewhere with a large amount of space in general, it'll still be a regular duel; it's only in the specified roads that you can turbo duel.

The following stuff will be demonstrated in more detail in future chapters, but in case you're curious about the mechanics of this game world…

Gaining territory has to do with an area's fractal code; if you control the fractal code, you control the area. It has a sensory mechanism; you win a duel against the old owner to win rights to it, and then you own that territory until someone wins it off you. If someone finds it, you're automatically engaged the next time you log on, hence the traps (using card effects eg. trap hole to make a hole in the ground for someone to fall into) to stop people from finding them easily…because, as a player, you don't want to spend every playing moment defending your territory.

You gain points by winning one on one duels (depending on the difference in rank) and scoring hits against any opponent in a "war" battle royale without dropping your life to 0. The life in the battle royale is the same as the life in an ordinary duel, ie. 8000, however in "war" battle royale, any amount you're engaged in within a session of playing the game (between logging on and logging off) you'll have the same 8000 points. For ordinary duels, ie. one on one, your points are renewed to 8000 whenever you go up against a new opponent.

The five duellists who guard the gate aren't on the list of players, which is part of the reason why people wonder whether they might be NPCs (non playable characters). Hence why the top five keep on changing, and yet no-one's managed to beat those five yet (as far as everyone knows of course).


	2. Chapter 1

**That Standing Gate  
Chapter 1**

Takuya set the opponent search to "random"; he found it more entertaining that way, winding up anywhere, in anybody's domain. After all, where was the true challenge if he was prepared? He wanted spontaneity; a true battle with guts and fists where the brains were left behind on the early stages. If he wanted an intellectual battle, he'd stick to school, after all. The Duel Monsters RPG World was a different place from that entirety.

The headset whirred in his ears, taking his player data and searching for a suitable active opponent. It was more important, now, to find a player who had a similar ranking to him. That'd give him the best battle, because, like him, they were aiming for the top: the top positions. That was an individual goal.

Of course, when a duellist was a part of a team, the team obtaining the highest rankings in the game was a collective goal – and they were getting close. His profile flashed on the screen; the computer had found an opponent for him, and soon it uploaded that information as well.

'Rank 4…' He grinned. 'Perfect.'

His rank was 2: newly obtained after beating out the previous second rank. He couldn't beat the first rank; they were aiming for a team victory after all, and the first rank had already been taken by a teammate: his best friend, Minamoto Kouji. It was the other positions they now needed to open up, for the rest of their team.

'But once we're done, we'll have a duel again.' He grinned, even if the other wasn't at the centre that day and couldn't possibly hear. He knew the sentiment anyway; the pair of them had shared a long rivalry. 'But first…'

He ok'ed the matchup and waited for the computer to open up an entrance. Like usual, he had two options: go through territory his team controlled and take a more strategic approach to the pre-battle…or charge in head first and make it a battle of wills. The reason was strategic: the reason he was duelling for his _team_ anyway – but he was an individual as well, and a duel meant more fun and more chances to fight and get stronger.

'_Remember your mission,'_ the annoying voice in his head scolded, sounding too much like Kouji.

'Shut up,' Takuya snapped at it. 'I know what I'm doing. Survival experience is important too, you know.'

'_Oh, prey tell how.'_

'Uhh…' It had to be important, he thought, because it existed in the game and was monitored. But only duel points determined rank: duel points determined by the ratio of wins and losses, by the difference in rank and experience between duellists and by the amount of "deaths" in survival duels. But "life" points didn't matter so much in survival duels beyond that: if they didn't hit 0, they were fine. Except those records were still kept, and could be pulled up any time. How much life they managed to escape with, how much they damaged an opponent…all of that was recorded, just like each single duel was recorded, for future reference. So there had to be a reason. No-one really knew why though. Just like no-one knew the purpose of their own lives, in the world outside RPGs, where he went to school and played baseball in the evenings and weekends and where others read books or painted or went to work or did something going towards some future they couldn't see.

If someone asked him what he wanted to do with his life, he'd say he'd become a policeman, or a fireman, or an ambulance officer, or a lawyer – because all those things sounded cool. But he didn't really _know_; he was just in seventh grade; there was plenty of time to find a future like that to move towards. The RPG world was far simpler: to be the best was the only aim: to obtain the first rank. And, if you had a team, you could go even further: take the top ranks…and then go for the gold. That so-called untouchable gate.

They had five members on their team: the maximum. And of the top five positions, they had ranks 1, 2 and 5. It was a fluctuating system; a few duels would change those numbers and so they had to keep duelling, keep winning, to keep those positions. It was Kouji's idea to beat out the third and fourth ranks at the same time, but of course those duellists were against it. The world was a competitive one, and they had no intention of letting anyone in to the spot.

Kouji preferred the more strategic approach and attacking the territory, making a duel inevitable. Takuya preferred to rely on luck for his encounter; after all, the random matching gave the duellist currently in the virtual rank with the rank closest to his own. He knew Kouji was at home, so his chances of catching rank 3 or 4 were pretty high.

And he'd nailed it. Though the truth was, you couldn't guarantee a duel with _anyone_.

The confirmation came back, along with an open gate. 'Flame Terminal,' Takuya repeated, with a grin. 'Been a while since I went there.'

It was a bit of a sore spot; he'd had that territory once – Flame Terminal, and its factory too – when he'd been a novice duellist. And he'd lost it. He'd been back a few times: he'd watched the territory change hands, played a few survival duels on its turf, a few one-on-one's. Actively attacking it wouldn't be a bad idea, he found himself thinking, before rapidly shaking his head. Kouji's ideas sounded appealing at times, but he was a stubborn one. Besides, the guy he was going to duel wasn't the one who owned the code of that area.

Then again, Kouji's idea hadn't been to just barge in without a plan…which was Takuya's favourite way of doing things.

'All right!' He straightened the headset and checked his deck and duel disk. Both were there and ready. 'Let's go!'

* * *

'Sometimes, I think he does these things just to piss me off,' Kouji grumbled, hanging up the phone and ignoring his step-mother's partially disapproving, partially disappointed stare. They had been watching a movie together…in a sense. Satomi had been the one to pick the movie, and while she'd tried to pick something two pre-teens would be interested in, it was difficult to when neither boy shared their interests with her.

'Who does?' she asked, still curious. A man jumping through the air was frozen on the screen, and she had her thumb on the remote, ready to press "play" again. 'Your friend…' She thought for a moment. 'Kanbara-kun, was it?'

Kouji made a nose of non-committal agreement as he pushed himself off the couch. 'I'm going to the game centre.'

'But –' She frowned a little.

Kouji shrugged. 'I was going later anyway.' He picked up his deck; he'd been fiddling with it even during the action-packed movie.

'True.' Though she had planned to finish the movie by then. She sighed; there wasn't much point trying to convince him. After all, the movie had been her idea and choice to begin with, and if he had something he wanted to do, then she didn't really have the right to stop him. 'Be safe.'

'Sure,' Kouji muttered, dropping the card case into his back pack, where the disk already sat. 'Whatever.'

He had his shoes on and was out the door before Satomi could say anything else – and before his brother could say a thing at all. Though, Satomi reflected, closing the door after his younger stepson and returning to his elder, Kouichi didn't look interested in saying anything at all. Or in the movie for that matter. He was staring at where Kouji's deck had been instead. Maybe he'd been staring at that before as well, trying to see the cards.

'You can go as well,' she smiled at him. 'If you're interested. I saw you have a deck; that should do.'

Kouichi looked at her slowly, then shook his head.

'Oh…okay then.' They both left her feeling so awkward. Kouji and Kouichi. Kouji she'd known for five years, Kouichi a little less than one. The situation was something she'd read about in books and watch on family dramas, and when she was young and dreaming, she'd never imagined being a part of it. But now she was older, divorced and remarried to another divorcee. She'd been lucky; she never could have kids (no matter how much she had wanted them in those days at the beginning of her married life), so that was one complication they'd escaped. Her husband had had two kids with his first wife: twins. And they'd been separated through the divorce.

They were reunited now, since the birth mother had passed away and Kousei now had custody of both his children. But the scars left behind were too big – and further complicated by the web of lies and hidden truths that had kept the twins from knowing about each other and their family for all those years. And now that they did have the chance, the barriers were too thick to pass through. Even innocent attempts to be a real family: sit down and watch a movie together, fell through the roof.

And she'd picked up little bits of Kouji over the five years she'd known him. She at least knew him a little. Kouichi, she felt, she barely knew at all. A stranger in her home…even if he was her husband's son. Both sons were strangers to her, and she was strangers to them as well: Satomi-san, the step-mother.

That was the sort of family they were.

'Do you want to keep watching this?' She gestured at the screen and watched the other return his gaze to hit. She shook her head behind him. 'I guess you don't like action movies, huh.'

She had to rely on little bits of body language from the both of them, build her library up slowly. Being a mother to another woman's children was difficult, she'd realised. They were both so closed off around her. Her progress was so slow that, sometimes, she did regret the life she had: with children so foreign to her. Things were easier when she hadn't known Kousei's other son, when Kouichi had lived with his mother. Kouji had been hard to know as it was.

Kouji wasn't much easier now than before, and she had Kouichi as well.

And Kouichi hadn't even shaken his head or nodded to her question. Closed ended questions: they left much to be desired, but it was easier to get a response from than ones that required essay explanations. Neither of them talked much. 'What sort of movies do you like? Supernatural? Horror? Drama? Fantasy?'

'I didn't watch many movies,' Kouichi replied quietly, gaze not shifting from the screen, even as Satomi ejected the DVD and switched the power off.

Satomi paused in her list of genres; it was especially awkward with Kouichi, because he'd lived with his mother: his real mother, in a totally different life to this one. 'What…do you like doing then?' she asked. 'Apart from reading, of course.'

Because a stepson curling up on the couch reading didn't make for ample bonding opportunities.

'What I like…' Kouichi shifted a little. With her back to him now, Satomi couldn't tell if he was staring at her or not. 'Drawing I guess?' He sounded unsure, and a little uncomfortable, and Satomi signed internally and backed away. She'd had five years to practise, but she still couldn't find the right things, the right questions.

'Well….I better get started on dinner. Any requests?'

'Anything's fine,' Kouichi said. If it had been Kouji, he'd have said: "Whatever", but in Satomi's eyes, the two answers were exactly the same anyway.

* * *

Flame Terminal didn't look too different to what Takuya remembered, but that was to be expected. Things didn't change much in the RPG world: the details were set into the code, and only little things like the characters and the temporary duel damage altered the predefined appearance. The duel damage was repaired quickly anyway; all it required was the person who owned the code to rescan it with their duel disks. Sometimes that was the new owner, having won the right to the code by defeating the old; the other times, it was the defending owner of said code.

The ability to damage the surroundings in survival duels was one of the things that made them more entertaining. The other thing was the blindness involved: the rushing about, the apparent lack of structure, and the traps that could be lurking anywhere. But it wouldn't start until he stepped on to the tracks; survival duels could only be played in certain area limits: major roads and train tracks were the two major ones.

He could see a few other players; their names rolled through the disk he wore on his arm, but he didn't bother expanding their data. He wasn't interested in them after all, and it didn't look like they were planning on jumping in to the tracks. In fact, they were talking to the white bear that was constantly there: one of the NPC characters whose function was to give, occasionally unhelpful, directions.

He couldn't see anything on the train tracks…yet, but that was another beauty of it. Not only did the tracks twist so vividly that seeing it entirely was impossible, the survival duel areas were masked from the outside by some sort of digital barrier. Even inside, it twisted about like a maze, cloaking and uncloaking as people moved. Anything could pop up from anywhere, and no-one could be sufficiently prepared.

So why prepare at all? There was nothing glaringly obvious, so Takuya pulled out the Fire Ball card and jumped on to the tracks, ready for a battle. Nothing jumped out at him straight away, which was a bit of a disappointment; he'd been hoping to send some fire out from the get-go. He couldn't see an active battle around him either, so all he could do was keep an eye out for an ambush and walk ahead.

The moment he rounded a bend, the Fire Ball magic card appeared in front of him before being shot through by a sparkling gold arrow. Magic-Effect Arrow, his duel disk read, the life point meter on it dropping by 500 points.

Takuya scowled, then grinned and drew out five more cards – his full hand – and slapping a monster out. He didn't bother with defence; he wasn't a defending guy after all, and so Tactical Warrior appeared before him with sword in hand, ready to fight.

It was immediately met with resistance: a rider on a black armoured horse with golden hair and dark wings. Dark Perseus, the disk read. Level: 5. Original attack strength: 1900. Current attack strength: 2500.

'Damn,' Takuya muttered, reading the effect. That duellist must've been there for a while to have accumulated six dark attribute monsters in his graveyard – more, possibly, if he was also using Dark Perseus' draw effect and removing a dark monster from play for it each time. Tactical Warrior was no match for it, even with the additional boost he could get from the trap Takuya held.

He took the damage instead: 900 points, leaving his life points at 6600. He drew and, getting nothing good, he ducked behind an outcropping. It wasn't a normal train track after all: the sloping walls, the small caves and lots of scattered rocks made it easier to dodge things. And then there was the unconventional use of the rules as well. Dark Perseus looked around for him; in the meantime, Takuya was able to draw another card. This time Pot of Greed, which he had to expose himself to use…but it was worth it. He drew two cards, then stared hard at a shimmering spot, before pointing his duel disk in that direction.

'Spell Absorption,' Takuya read off his disk, before grinning. The same person who played Magic Effect Shattering, I bet.'

He ducked as Dark Perseus shot a beak at him, ready for the counter-strike. 'Surging Flame Spirit! Direct attack!'

It was Surging Flame Spirit's special power, though in a survival duel it had one disadvantage: he needed to find the opponent first. Luckily, the guy was seeming rather confident after the Dark Perseus on his field, and a quick scan revealed his location…and some other information as well. 'Go!' He pointed to an outcropping, and the monster: a kid with a scarecrow hat, threw his burning staff.

There was a yelp and Takuya watched the number that had come up with the duellist's location and current status drop. '2300 – so you _have_ been here a while.'

He wondered if it was another territorial battle, or two teams battling it out. He couldn't see anything else, but he was still fairly close to the terminal entrance. Too close, really; he needed to get to the factory on the _other_ side.

Takuya shrugged to himself. 'Oh well,' he shrugged. 'This is still fun.'

He watched Dark Perseus turn to attack another monster: a Reaper of Prophecy that was pulling its scythe out of a Lancer Daemon. The dark fiend vanished quickly after, the card sent to the card graveyard and boosting Dark Perseus up even more, so when the 2000 attack strength Reaper of Prophecy took the fall, it was with 600 points of damage.

Dark Perseus set its sights on Raging Flame Sprite who, after the successful direct attack, was now at 1300 attack points. Takuya hastily drew a card and, without looking at it, ordered Raging Flame Sprite around the dark fairy again. It scored another hit against the player who'd moved into the open to try and avoid him –

Takuya blinked. He had received _two_ direct hits, and one looked like a water attack to him. It looked like he had tried to avoid both and tripped over his own two feet.

Takuya checked his duel disk. He was right; there were two attacks. His own, that dealt 1300 points of damage, dropping the other's life to 1000, and then Dragon-Riding Squad of the Sea Emperor had attacked with its 1800 attack points and a similar effect and finished the job.

'Dragon-Riding Squad of the Sea Emperor,' Takuya repeated, before glaring at the girl who appeared beside him. 'I didn't need help, Chiaki.'

'Who cares about that?' she asked with a grin. 'I'm the one who needs to up my rank. _I _wouldn't mind _your_ help though.'

Takuya couldn't help but grin at that; Mizumi Chiaki was capable of handling herself and they both knew it. Sure, she wasn't Takuya or Kouji, but they were a pair of hot-heads always down each other's throats so no-one else _could_ be like them. Chiaki was cool though; she gave him a run for his money often, particularly since her deck was a direct contrast to his own – except when the both of them played cards that directly attacked the player, like just then.

'I'm rank 6 right now,' she continued. 'A healthy win will give me a boost up to rank 4 – 5 if Tomoki-kun manages to sneak something in. How the hell that kid got ahead of me…' She trailed off, shaking her head. 'Ah, well.'

She flipped a card on her disk, and Takuya blinked as a wall of water blocked a strike from an incoming magician. Empeur the Magical Nobleman, Takuya read off his duel disk. Another high level monster.

'Whoops.' Chiaki grinned as her Tornado Wall died down. 'Looks like he's going after your Raging Flame Sprite.'

'What?!' Takuya checked his cards; Chiaki was right; her trap wouldn't protect him – not that he'd take any damage if Raging Flame Sprite was destroyed. They were equal at 2300 attack points. Still, there was no reason to lose a monster when he could still use it. 'Direct attack!' he yelled.

It was repelled by a shield Takuya was _positive_ did not come from Empeur the Magical Nobleman. Or from Chiaki – who Takuya noticed was sneaking off. Which he should have been doing, really. Survival duels could go on for a fair amount of time if enough people joined in and weren't particularly high yield; the idea was to get in and out as fast as possible and still with life points left, not to win – but Takuya loved to try and win anyway. There was something there that wasn't present with normal duels.

He scanned the scene again and found the culprit: ? from another duellist – who still had full life points. A new addition like Chiaki; someone who'd caught up to them dawdling in the first bend. He couldn't see Chiaki anymore; she'd made it past the first bend.

Takuya wanted that duel, but the guy currently with the code wasn't the guy who'd beaten him almost three years ago, so it wasn't that big of a deal. Chiaki _did_ need that one-on-one more, and Takuya…well, he could have just as much fun in a battle royale survival duel.

Besides, Mr Rank 4 would still be waiting for him somewhere in the factory.

* * *

Kouji sighed when Chiaki's phone went on to her message bank. Of course she'd go after Takuya; she was itching for a chance to boost her rank. Though it wasn't risky for her at all; if she lost, it would be a bit of a setback, but not a big deal. If he or Takuya or Tomoki lost, they'd lose their places in the top five as well – and then a swarm of duellists would attack them for those coveted seats. It was a pain he'd rather avoid, at least at this point.

He wasn't sure he liked having secured the first rank; it had just happened that way. In his opinion, second was better. He would still have something to aim for then, a personal goal, as opposed to just a team. Because everything from here on out, until they had the first five and could attack the Gate, was all about the others. If he stayed out of riskier duels, he'd be fine. They didn't need new territory; that would only be a hindrance if they had to continuously defend at this point. To get to the strongest, you attacked their territories. If you were lucky, you could catch them somewhere else. The lower down you were, the more you had to aim for. Sure, he was curious about the Gate: it was a challenge no-one else had beaten and that made it interesting. But keeping a lead wasn't as satisfying as fighting for one – but no, Takuya had that lucky position.

Yes, he had to maintain his rank, but a duel a day would do it, so long as he kept on winning. That's why he'd been planning on going to the centre later on; he didn't need to be there then, right after lunch like the others, so excited about the chance to secure their position. And if there was any territorial attack, one of the others could handle it. Takuya was supposed to do the same; that way, the two of them could protect their decisions, save themselves some time and possible grief. He wasn't so excited he couldn't sleep, but he'd still worked hard and didn't want it to go to waste.

He wasn't sure what had attracted him about that untouched Gate, but somewhere along the line he'd decided he wanted to pursue it. He wasn't even sure what had attracted him about the Duel Monsters RPG; it had just been something everyone had been doing when he'd first moved to Shibuya, and his father had been convinced that it would be a good way to make new friends. And, Kouji had to grudgingly admit, it had worked…to a degree. Takuya he'd met almost straight away, and they'd managed to get under each other's skin but made a good team when they got into a pinch with the survival duels. That was, of course, before they realised it didn't really affect their ranks. That temporary team up had led Takuya to the idea of permanently establishing a group…and that was what had happened. Instead of fighting it, Kouji had just gone along with things and he found he didn't mind travelling to the centre and plunging into the virtual world every other afternoon. It was better than any club, or cram school, or home. And it was a good excuse to get out. And waste credit so his father could drown under the illusion of his son's social life.

That didn't mean he loved the game, or the virtual world. He felt that, if he'd gone to another place, involved in another popular activity, he'd feel much the same. It was a game world based on luck and strategy and individualism and teamwork and the competitive natures of children and teenagers: the age bracket the RPG aimed at.

Though there was the rare person like his brother that showed absolutely no interest in making an account and joining the virtual world. But more common were people like Takuya who would take any opportunity that didn't take them away from greater loves (in Takuya's case: food, baseball and beauty sleep), and fairly common still were people like Kouji who were just swept up in things.

And it was really easy to get swept up in things. Sure, there was a fee, and the price for train tickets and phone calls and keeping the disks charged and maintained, but all of that was manageable in a child's allowance – cheaper than arcade games because it was a fixed subscription: if you logged in one time or a thousand, you payed the same. And those who already had train passes for school could just double up those – though he walked; his school wasn't far. Lucky too, since it was one of those guaranteed pathway ones; he won't have to think about the entrance exams that other students will have to start studying frantically for soon – and then, those who wanted to go to more specialised schools like the manga or performing arts ones, will also have to prepare portfolios or for auditions or interviews. He didn't have to do any of that; if he scored highly in his final year of senior school, he would be guaranteed entry into Todai University. The school had been a bit of a travel when he'd forced joined, but they'd moved closer since. And the school was okay; it was challenging, the people varied but more or less left him alone, and he was getting somewhere.

He wanted to get somewhere in the Duel Monsters world as well, even if it was just a game, just a thing kids did when they got off school to unwind, and socialise. He didn't care much for socialising – or he told himself that anyway; in fact he _did_ enjoy hanging out with his team, otherwise he wouldn't have stayed with them. And he honestly didn't mind travelling half an hour by train to the nearest game centre to enter the virtual world – though he wasn't going to admit that to Takuya _or_ Chiaki, the latter of whom was tamer but no less impulsive than the former.

Though standing in a train for half an hour was a different matter; one he didn't terribly mind admitting…even if it wasn't always true. He didn't like Satomi at all…another thing not necessarily true; he could like her, if he tried and didn't stubbornly tell himself otherwise. He could accept his family as it was now, if he put in more effort towards being nicer instead of being stubborn – but he didn't want things to change like that. The way his life was now…that was fine.

Doors opened, then closed, and Kouij glanced up to see the next station. Just a routine thing, because he knew he still had a ways to go. Though he wasn't in any rush. Even if he didn't go, it didn't matter; even if Takuya had unwittingly plunged into a territorial battle, he and Chiaki could probably handle things on their own. And Teppei and Tomoki might show up as well – though he supposed Takuya and Chiaki wanted to be get the top before they had to slow down for exams.

He supposed he could accept that – and glare daggers into Takuya when they next saw each other, like the ritual they always undertook together.

He glanced at his disk, checking the status. Chiaki had a few cards out and full life points; it seemed she was sprinting through the survival duel. Takuya on the other hand…

Kouji rolled his eyes as he watched Super-Hot Blooded Ball Kid's attack points go up and down. 'What the heck is that guy doing?'

* * *

Takuya grimaced as another fire attribute monster on his field was destroyed. That new guy and his Shaddoll Dragon were really annoying with its flip effect, and the survival duels unfortunately favoured flip monsters. They were so easy to hide and protect, and there were so many cards that could flip them face down again so their effects could be used again and again. For some reason, the other guy wasn't targeting Super-Hot Blooded Ball Kid – but Takuya was still finding his other monsters returning to his hand just as fast as he could resummon them.

And it didn't help that he'd picked up another spellcaster around the third or fourth bed with a Dark Red Enchanter that was shooting cards out of Takuya's hands. He, Takuya, was down to 1300 life points and almost at the final corner of the set limits of the survival duel (since the train tracks extended all the way to the Forest Terminal which was quite far off) and that the guy he'd been trading blows with since the first corner still had 500 life points and Diable the Magical Demon Knight with its 2500 attack points and its self-renewing ability on his field. Takuya was doing better on the life points front, but his Super-Hot Blooded Ball Kid's attack points were fluctuating between 1500 and 3500 (and they'd been 4500 before Shaddoll Dragon had ruined his little combo.

_Why the hell are there three spellcaster users here at the same time anyway?_ Takuya grumbled to himself. And why were they all picking on him? The idea of a survival duel was to attack anyone who wasn't a teammate –

He trailed off, watching one summon an Effect Veiler and another a Mystic Piper, and the third tuning them both with Shaddoll Dragon –

'Oh oh,' he muttered, quickly pulling three cards (since all of them had played something before him) and looking at what he had in his hands. Nothing to stop a synchro summoning for sure – nor to stop Tempest Magician once she emerged. It only had 2200 attack points…but that was the least of his problems now. Those three had more cards in their hand than him, and they could discard any number to deal him 500 points of damage per card.

They only needed to discard three between them, and it would be game over.

'Damn.' He stared at his cards, reading their print even though he'd used them so often now he knew their effects by heart. 'There has to be something –'

His eyes narrowed in on a trap: one particular trap card: perhaps the only one in his deck that _could_ get him out of the jam that was that magician.

He stuffed it into the s/t slot of his disk a hair's breath before the first discard went through on the opponent's side. He just had to hope there wasn't a fourth duellist hiding out of sight; he still didn't know where the hell that guy with the Shaddoll cards had come from, though it was obvious now they'd been trying to ambush him.

And he'd been looking forward to his lucky _random_ encounter too.

* * *

**A/N:** Hmm…additional explanations. Firstly, the team system. In the rankings, they still count as individuals, so for a team to be ranked first, the first however many people in their team positions have to be occupied by them. Eg. if there's five people in the team, they have to be the top five to be the first ranked team. In survival duels, you can use your teammates cards as if you're in a tag duel, though anyone outside that is potentially an opponent, ie. like a battle royale. The rules aren't so straightforward; so long as your opponent has played one card or declared one attack, you can draw your card and continue your turn, so things are a little messier. Also, attacks can be avoided by being out of range, aka. distance or hiding behind glitches (that have only briefly been mentioned so far), and your monster can attack monster B to avoid an attack from monster A. Ranges are limited by the duel disk – but it's not just about the cards. :D And you're under no obligation to defeat opponents; it's smarter to do what Chiaki did and build a good defence and then run.

Next, Takuya's team: the members are Takuya, Chiaki (from Angemon's kids), Kouji, Tomoki and the fifth who I haven't mentioned yet (I don't think so anyway). Not the same five who were Ofanimon's warriors. Though all ten will show up at some point or other. And that bit about Kouichi and Satomi wasn't originally supposed to be there; it just made this fic (and chapter) a whole lot longer…


End file.
